Friday, 24 September 2010

I'll Show You Those in Troubles Reign, Losing a Mite, a Mountain Gain.

It's so easy to get caught up in the story, for outcomes to determine identity, and for causes and conditions to define the apparent substance of our persona. Consciousness likes this; consciousness delights in it. Remember that whatever conditioning seems to be present and whatever it is that is perceived, it is a phantom, just a thought, mere unreconstituted energy appearing as what is. Any conceptualising of it is simply the story of it. What is, is what is; this, just as it is, is what you've been looking for all your life. You never lost it; you never were what you thought you were; you are it.

The goals, the grief, the happiness, the bliss, the murderous intentions - they are not what you are. It may seem a wrench to contemplate the death of the persona as what you ultimately are, but persona still comes up. All the apparent causes and conditions still come up, or seem to. If the story of what you are and how that story turns out is not the thing that "what you are" depends upon, the story can, at last, just be enjoyed, relished, resisted, everything. You are not enjoying it, that personality you seem to think you are - the lattice of thought and the myriad feelings you think you are, even the thought that thinks it is what you are - is not enjoying it. It is enjoyed, by itself. Relishment relishes itself, and life simply lives.

There is a quality to being. It seems that quality of existence at its most essential is the specialness and singularity we associate with our selves. Our selves, our persona, our likes and dislikes, prejudices and inclinations, body shape and health, belief systems and emotional baggage are the ever-changing extras we take to be who we are. But that essential quality - that feeling of "I am me" that we have all the time, that we feel when we look into the mirror in the morning, that me-ness, that specialness, that abiding sense of being here now is what all sentient beings feel. We are one, we are united, we are the same thing. We are what life empties into. We are the unchanging what-it-is that sees itself, for the sake of seeing it. We are all there is. Even the discontent is what-it-is. Even the idea that this is not enough is it. It is undeniably always here, and always now.

This clip embodies the perfect illustration of how iffy perception of the "real world" is: the amazing, achingly funny Father Ted tries to explain perspective to Dougal.

I had strong murderous intentions from the very get-go this morning, troublingly. Thank you, Suzanne, for helping me to accept such passionate urges for what they are. (However it's probably too late to explain to the wasp that woke me up our energetic union, although i trust he/she may have a deeper sense from under that book since they became so close...)

Hi Mary, thanks for stopping by, I watched about two minutes of the JF video where he and that guy get the giggles and I honestly found it annoying. Forgive the nonexistent apparent conditioning. I get the giggles with my kids all the time.

Good job then i didn't need to sit cross legged and explain it to him/her! I am also all the other sentient creatures in slaughterhouses from which i have never once eaten any products (ok maybe once or twice but more to break what seemed to becoming self-righteous dogma than 'good god, that looks tasty!'). I try to be more relaxed now and reserve judgement, although i still think it's unnecessary and sad, particularly factory farming. Wasps on the other hand, deserve everything they get (joke).

The "outer" world has an influence on our reaction to it. Otherwise we could walk in the freezing rain with no clothes. It would be more than wonderful if all reality were is our own production of it. Form is emptiness, emptiness is form. Mind only is half the equation. Trying to figure out the whole equation is a waste of precious time. To be sure, surety is our worst enemy. :)

Hey Chana, nothing is ever wasted. Nothing can ever be wasted. Relatively, in the film of life, one of the plotlines may well be about time wasted; but the characters on the screen simply live out the plots, and cannot choose how to spend their time.

Suzanne says " nothing is ever wasted. Nothing can ever be wasted. Relatively, in the film of life, one of the plotlines may well be about time wasted; but the characters on the screen simply live out the plots, and cannot choose how to spend their time."

Yes, this is true that in reality nothing is wasted....even decaying sentient beings feed mother earth and the multitude of creatures that roam the earth. No thought or feeling is wasted, because it is all that can be, that this mysterious universe has produced. What a truly excellent viewpoint. Now if i could only thread the filmstrip into the projector and the movie run smoothly without it breaking in the middle of the story! :) Love your writing!

Hi Lisa, I changed the clip, this one seems to work for everyone. Perspective is great to play with- I love those photographs where someone in the distance appears to be standing on the foreground subject's palm!

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